Brewster F2A colours?

[phat trev]

Would anyone know what USN or US Marine squadrons had F2A painted up in 'late war' 3 tone schemes like below?

I am currently upgrading the Matchbox Buffalo (a lot!) and fancy this scheme as I have only seen it used on later aircraft such as Hellcats and Corsairs etc..

[jimmaas]

No operational squadrons, I'm afraid; the F2A had been relegated to training units by the time the 'three tone' color scheme came into use.. The scheme was carried by at least this aircraft used for advanced training in Florida in 1943.

By the way, the drawing (based on one from the In Action book) shows the ventral window on an F2A-3, and this is inaccurate. F2A-3's did not have the ventral window, although they did have the framing and the two oval carbon monoxide vents.

Edited January 26, 2012 by jimmaas

[JOAN]

Hello,

You have some infos and nice pics here :

http://www.history.navy.mil/photos/ac-usn22/f-types/f2a.htm

and here :

http://www.history.navy.mil/photos/ac-usn2...types/f2a-g.htm

http://www.history.navy.mil/photos/ac-usn2...pes/f2a-msc.htm

Hope this is helpful.

cheers

Olivier

[phat trev]

No operational squadrons, I'm afraid; the F2A had been relegated to training units by the time the 'three tone' color scheme came into use.. The scheme was carried by at least this aircraft used for advanced training in Florida in 1943.

By the way, the drawing (based on one from the In Action book) shows the ventral window on an F2A-3, and this is inaccurate. F2A-3's did not have the ventral window, although they did have the framing and the two oval carbon monoxide vents.

Thanks jimmass, just to clarify the verntral window situation a lttle more please, exactly what bit is not on the -3?

Great photos there but none of three tone F2A's which is a pity they really are very hard to find.

[LDSModeller]

Thanks jimmass, just to clarify the verntral window situation a lttle more please, exactly what bit is not on the -3?

Hi phat trev

This quote by Jim from Brewster forums hopefully will help

Ventral Windows

Further to illustrate see following "Doctored" picture

Vetral window sections deleted but retaining Oval vents for CO (carbon Monoxide) venting

Regards

Alan

[JMChladek]

All the remaining Buffalos were taken out of front line service after Midway and relegated to advanced trainers on the East Coast. Closest scheme you could get to that one would be the two tone blue over gray scheme used by VMF-221 at Midway as it did not have the red circles on the stars or the stripped rudders (same goes for VMF-211's birds which were also taken back to the states after Midway). According to the references I've got, very few of the training Buffalos ever got the three tone scheme and most of the remaining Buffalos got worn out and were ordered scrapped by the end of 1943 and early 1944 (one test bird supposedly soldiered on until June 1945 though).

As for photos, the only one of a three tone Buffalo I found is on page 48 of the Squadron book. It is a head on picture of a crashed training bird in August of 1943 (white 48, the same bird in your linked painting).

Be aware if you do an F2A-3, the nose will need to be extended a little bit from the front wheel wells since it got lengthened slightly. On a Matchbox kit, the easiest way to do it would probably be to chop the nose just behind the cowl and stick in a plasti-card shim section to get the required length.

Edited January 29, 2012 by JMChladek